Toughie 3135 – Big Dave's Crossword Blog
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Toughie 3135

by Gazza  

Toughie No 3135 by Beam
Hints and tips by Gazza

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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***


This is a fairly typical Beam Toughie, though there are no ‘first letters’ clues and the Queen is having day off. Thanks to Beam for the enjoyment – I wonder if he was one of the prominent figures from Britain and France invited to last night’s banquet at Versailles?

Please leave a comment telling us how you fared and what you thought of the puzzle.

Across Clues

1a Criminal’s case about bride’s last vow (10)
CONSECRATE: an informal word for a criminal with the ‘S and a wooden case bracket the last letter of bride.

6a Son, Eve’s third, Father essentially provided (4)
SETH: this Biblical character comes from assembling the abbreviation for son, the third letter of Eve and the central letters of father. Very neat!

9a Old bloke’s tense following desire (5)
COVET: an informal word for an old bloke followed by the grammatical abbreviation for tense.

10a Driver in pole position? (9)
GONDOLIER: cryptic definition of a possibly Venetian driver.

12a Chattier about one billion net returns (7)
GABBIER: string together a preposition meaning about, the Roman numeral one, the abbreviation for billion and a verb to net or secure. Now reverse the lot.

13a Audibly burnt vegetable (5)
CHARD: this sounds like burnt or singed.

15a Allowing gambling losing head for pound (7)
LETTING: a synonym of gambling has its first letter swapped for the abbreviation of a pound sterling.

16a Most mysterious bug possibly by river (7)
DEEPEST: what may be a bug follows the name of a river of which there are four in the UK.

18a Zeppelin tune’s welcome with public, firstly (7)
AIRSHIP: concatenate a synonym of tune, the ‘S, a welcoming word and the first letter of public.

20a Yours truly inspires learner who’s pioneering (7)
SETTLER: what Beam is in the crossword world contains our usual learner.

21a Humble sailor’s embracing a sweetheart (5)
ABASE: the abbreviation for a humble sailor and the ‘S contain A. Finish with Beam’s usual swEetheart.

23a European country with sex in mind (7)
BRITAIN: insert a short informal word for sexual activity into a synonym of mind to get the informal name of a European country.

25a Three-legged race? (9)
TRIATHLON: the three legs involve in turn swimming, cycling and running.

26a Did I omit to mask expression? (5)
IDIOM: hidden word.

27a Longs heartlessly showing desires (4)
YENS: a verb meaning longs loses the two letters at its heart.

28a Cutting cord in a hospital department (10)
ASTRINGENT: insert a synonym of cord between A and Crosswordland’s usual hospital department.

Down Clues

1d Source of drug company scam exposed (4)
COCA: stick together the abbreviation for company and the inner letters of scam to get a source of cocaine.

2d Initially nervous flier welcomes good pilot (9)
NAVIGATOR: start with the initial letter of nervous and add a flier containing the abbreviation for good.

3d Firm foundation (13)
ESTABLISHMENT: double definition, the first a firm or business.

4d Manipulating cartel abducting one horse? (7)
RIGGING: a word for a cartel or syndicate captures the Roman one and how a child might describe a horse.

5d Crusader beat Communists’ top revolutionary (7)
TANCRED: I vaguely remembered this chap from history lessons. Glue together a verb to beat or thrash, the top letter of Communists and a revolutionary or Leftist.

7d Flower single caught in important date (5)
ERICA: the letter meaning single and the cricket abbreviation for caught go inside a distinct period of history.

8d Family from present time in journal (10)
HEREDITARY: how a student may indicate that he/she is present at a roll-call followed by a journal containing the physics abbreviation for time.

11d Scoring, alternatively helping around box (13)
ORCHESTRATION: a conjunction linking alternatives and a helping or quota contain a large box.

14d Joke of Left accepted by proletariat (10)
PLEASANTRY: the abbreviation of left goes inside a synonym of proletariat.

17d Worker in, say, train plant (9)
EGLANTINE: insert one of our usual working insects into an abbreviation meaning ‘say’ and a train or file.

19d Pilfers, oddly pinching flag stones (7)
PEBBLES: the odd letters of pilfers contain a verb to flag or diminish.

20d Lure of southern London suburb (7)
SPINNER: the abbreviation of southern and the name of a suburb in north-west London produce an angler’s lure.

22d Deceit admitted by a new immigrant (5)
ALIEN: a deceit goes between A and the abbreviation of new.

24d Sentence overturned leading to discharge (4)
EMIT: reverse the sentence that a judge may condemn a criminal to.

The clues making my podium today were 10a, 25a and 11d. Which one(s) worked best for you?

 

18 comments on “Toughie 3135”

  1. Managed to complete it albeit with quite a few guesses, advantage of playing online. 5d was last in, never heard of him. Took ******** which is my usual time for cryptic so quite pleased.

    [Please don’t quote solving times. For the reason see point #6 in the Site Etiquette. Gazza]

  2. I thought this was pretty good. The one I liked the most was 10a, and the one that produced a smile was 25a.
    My last one in was 5d. I guessed it early on from the clear wordplay, but waited until the end to see if google would confirm my guess. I’m sure I have heard of him somewhere before; sounds like he should be in a beer advertisement! (perhaps I am thinking of the Whitbread advert with Abdul La BulBul… :) )

    Thanks to Beam, and to Gazza.

  3. I had a few ‘unheard-ofs’ in this, including the Norman Crusader, the plant in 17d and the old bloke in 9a. All were gettable, and fairly clued by Beam. I had ticks against the clever 6a, with 10a, 25a and 4d, which all made me smile. Very enjoyable.

    Thanks to Beam and Gazza

  4. All the usual humour and stretchy synonyms from our setter with an unexpected bit of GK in 5d which I did feel the need to check post-solve. Good of him to give Her Majesty a break – dear old lady is doubtless grateful for a short rest.
    Not particularly in favour of 12a but plenty to fill the podium – 6,10,20&23a plus 4d all making the cut.

    Devotions as ever to Mr T/Beam and many thanks to Gazza for the review and the cartoons which were as hilarious as always!

  5. Really enjoyed this super puzzle and, as the required GK fortunately fell within the limits of my own, it all came into place reasonably swiftly for an inside-pager. Lovely concise clueing, plenty of lateral thinking needed, good fun and witty. I share Jane’s view of 12a, and for me the Hon Mentions were 6a, 10a and 28a, 5d, 11d & 20d.

    Many thanks indeed to RayT and of course also to Gazza.

  6. Twice in one week! I’m feeling very smug. It can’t be long before the fall which follows pride or someone tells me it was the simplest puzzle this year. I had to dig deep into my memory pit to retrieve the answer to 5d and I really don’t like the word at 12a. Otherwise very enjoyable – I’m usually on wavelength with Ray T and don’t even find his synonyms as far off beam as some do. Favourite today was 10a supported by the amusing 6a and 25a. Thanks to Beam and Gazza.

  7. This was typical Beam and superb fun, even though I needed to use a crossword solver on T?N?RED to find the extremely obscure answer to 5d.

    10a was my favourite which was joined on my podium by 23a & 4d

    Many thanks to Beam and to Gazza – great cartoons as ever.

  8. Such a good puzzle; hard but not too hard and great surface reads. Gets a **** for enjoyment from me. Needed Gazza’s help to understand 16a because I had the river as the Pest which meant the mysterious bug was a mystery, hey ho. Thank yous to Mr T and to Gazza. Welcome back, email notifications for this site.

  9. Plain sailing until 3 to go then 4&5d + 10a took almost as long as the rest of it. No excuses, other than brain fog, for two of them but it needed all the checkers in before I pegged the wordplay for the siege of Antioch fella & then a post solve visit to Mr G to read all about him. A very enjoyable & accessible guzzle – a delightful contrast to yesterday’s obscurity laden Toughie.
    Thanks to Beam & to Gazza – great cartoon pics as per

  10. LOI was 4d as I was convinced I was looking for a horse, then the penny dropped. 🤦‍♂️ Beam on fine form and as usual it’s hard to pick a favourite but I’ll go with 6a. I knew he was a biblical figure and when I checked I found he was Eve’s third, very clever. Thanks to Beam and Gazza.

  11. Very enjoyable! For me a puzzle that straddled Beam and his alter ego on the back-pagers in difficulty level but a whole host of fun as per.
    Wasn’t overly keen on 1a but thankfully things improved considerably henceforth.
    I’ve ticked 10&23a plus 4&11d.
    Many thanks to the aforementioned Beam and to Gazza.

  12. Great puzzle. Add me to the camp that had to check their construction for 5d. 10a gets my vote.

    Thanks to Beam & Gazza.

    1. Good evening, Mr T, great puzzle as usual – despite 12a! The small dollop of GK came as a surprise but was very fairly clued for which I thank you!
      So – to answer Gazza’s question – were you amongst the invited guests at the palace last night?

  14. Great to be receiving the blog again.

    For some reason I stumbled over 7d…..just couldn’t see it because I was hunting for a river.

    11d my favourite, but the least said about 5d the better!

    Thanks to Gazza for the blog and Beam.

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